The present invention relates generally to retinal prosthesis devices, and more particularly to integrated retinal prosthesis devices and methods of manufacturing one or multiple such devices in monolithic processes.
Intraocular retinal prostheses typically can be considered to comprise three separate subsystems. One subsystem typically includes a radiofrequency coil for power and data transmission and recovery to an externally placed coil. A second subsystem typically includes a multielectrode array for retinal stimulation. The third subsystem typically includes an integrated circuit or discrete components for power recovery and data decoding with analog and/or digital circuitry for driving the electrode array. FIG. 1 shows and example of such a prosthesis and its component subsystems.
However, these three components are fabricated as separate components and combined to form the prosthesis system. This typically requires multiple fabrication processes, e.g., one for each device component, in addition to a process for interconnecting and coupling the various components together to form the prosthesis system. Such an overall system fabrication process can be overly complex and time consuming and inefficient. Additionally, the electrode arrays do not take into consideration the topology of the target retinal cells to be stimulated.
Therefore it is desirable to provide systems and methods that overcome the above and other problems. In particular, it is desirable to provide systems and methods that are fast and reliable and which allow for multiple system components to be fabricated in a monolithic fabrication process. It is further desirable that such systems include electrode arrays that are optimized for enhanced retinal stimulation.